In Which Percy's Just Trying to Live
by DinoDina
Summary: Percy's just trying to write a love letter. And that's not easy — not when Fred and George are experimenting, not when his mother's yelling. Oneshot written for QLFC.


**Team:** Wigtown Wanderers  
 **Position:** Beater 2  
 **Prompt:** Banshee: Write about someone who constantly complains or nags.  
 **Additional Prompts:** 4\. (dialogue) "If you're the smartest person in the room, get out of here.", 9. (phrase) drop of a hat, 15. (sound) explosion  
 **Words:** 1276

 **Thanks to Bailey and Aya for betaing!**

Percy sat back and looked at what he'd just written. Four pages, all sappy bullshit, and all of it straight from the heart. Ha! — he couldn't resist a snicker at the thought: what he was writing was anything but straight. He was a scholar, not a romantic, but he was trying. For Oliver, he was trying.

For his mother.

He heard her voice from downstairs, as if summoned: " _George_!"

So that's what the explosion had been. He'd heard it at the same time as he'd moved onto the third page of the letter, but had paid it no mind. Strange noises were always coming out of Fred and George's room — funny how they all spent so much time at the Burrow despite having their own flats — and if he reacted to every single one of them — well, he'd never have the time for anything else. He knew his brothers saw him as an incessant nag, but he could pick his battles. And dealing with the twins' experiments was his mother's domain.

"Fred!" she yelled then, and Percy shut his eyes in annoyance. The moment he'd given up on lecturing his brothers — about seven years after he'd left Hogwarts and moved out of the Burrow, though he still visited frequently — had been a blessed moment indeed!

He didn't have the time to deal with Fred and George and whatever ridiculous thing they were doing — and he didn't have the time to deal with his mother's anger, either.

"How many times do I have to tell you? You've got your own flat, and if you must illegally experiment, do it there!" Her voice faded into annoyed muttering for a moment, and Percy chuckled at how wrong she was. There were loopholes for such magical experimentation — he would know, he'd helped Fred and George find them. At the time, it hadn't been an altruistic act on Percy's part. Though he'd had a good relationship with his family, he'd been stupidly ashamed of them all, and the very idea of his brothers getting in trouble with the law had been unthinkable, not when he'd been working his way up the Ministry ranks.

"Honestly…" she continued.

And Percy thought it would end there. Years and years of ignoring his family — for most of his Hogwarts years and a few afterwards, when it felt like the best response to his brothers' taunts and his mother's emotional appeals — had served him well, and he was able to turn back to the letter.

"Everyone's married and dating," his mother had said several days previously. "I'm not counting Charlie, but he seems to be a lost battle — but you know what I mean! You should get out of the house more, Percy! And work…" She'd shaken her head, then. "You're never going to meet anyone if you're so shut in all the time."

Percy didn't want to be the one to break the news to his mother that he didn't _want_ to go out and meet new people. That was Fred's thing, George's thing, Bill's thing, Charlie's thing — now that he thought about it, it was _everyone's_ thing. Just not his.

Which was where Oliver came in.

If, nine years ago, someone came up to Percy and said, "You're going to write Oliver Wood a four-page love letter," Percy would have spent two hours explaining two things: he was _not_ gay and he was _not_ interested in Oliver. He'd have spent another hour explaining that love letters were _not_ necessary and were in fact a nuisance to both of the involved parties.

Now… well. Percy stood up and called over Hermes, who flew down from his perch and dutifully held out his leg for the letter.

He watched the owl fly off, which was when his mother's dulcet tones once more pierced the relative silence of the Burrow. He was about to tune her out again — Percy knew he wouldn't be himself if he didn't overthink the love letter seven times in one evening — when his own name reached his ears.

"And what about Percy, huh? While you're exploding things — and _please_ don't get me wrong, I admire your shop and your inventions — he's sitting trying to do honest work! It's a marvel he's not out here right now!"

Percy sighed at his mother's low estimate of his character. Yes, once upon a time he would have been out there — he would have been the first one out there.

He'd been the first one there two years previously, when an explosion had rocked the house and caused half of his ceiling to collapse. He'd been more on-edge, then, quick to anger and annoyance at the drop of a hat, and when he'd recovered from the sudden cloud of plaster and wood splinters, he'd Apparated to Fred and George's room.

His mouth had been open and ready to deliver a tirade — he'd been so angry the words were already slipping free without his knowledge, forming a cloud of bitterness and disappointment — when he'd been stopped with a "Shush."

Neither Fred nor George had looked at him — that had hurt most of all, more than the destroyed room and incessant explosions — but one of them had said: "If you're the smartest person in the room, get out of here."

"That means you, Perce," the other added.

Percy had always prided himself on being the smartest person in the room. But to hear it said in such a tone, to be _scorned_ for it… he'd Disapparated immediately.

He hadn't reacted violently — or much at all — to the twins after that. They had their explosions and Percy had his Ministry paperwork, and everything in between, everything that really mattered to brotherhood, was common ground.

So when his mother's voice grew quieter once more, Percy cautiously leaned out of his room, made eye contact with all three of them, and said: "Any and all explosions are alright with me, so long as the house stays intact."

He closed the door and immediately looked out of the window, hoping to see Hermes but knowing that the owl was long gone. Percy tried not to be nervous, but he'd just sent a love letter! To Oliver Wood, no less!

It wasn't that he didn't _like_ Oliver. They'd been on-and-off dating for two years now, and had lived together at Hogwarts for seven years as best friends. It was just… Percy couldn't _not_ overthink things. Like what socks he was wearing, what he had for breakfast, what color ink he used to fill out Ministry forms, what he ordered for lunch when he and Oliver went out, what he said to his mother or brothers or father or Ginny, what he put in the love letter he'd sent to Oliver — the very fact that he'd sent a love letter to Oliver!

But his mother had suggested something romantic. Not that she knew about his relationship — she was probably hoping for someone sensible and new — but it had been a good sentiment. And like Fred and George's message after they'd demolished his ceiling, Percy had gotten hers loud and clear — or at least an interpretation of it.

He liked Oliver, he really did. And if he had four pages of parchment to say so, he was damned well going to use all four pages. So with the letter sent, there was nothing more to think about. Maybe it was going to work out: Oliver would read the letter and promptly replace their off-and-on relationship with an _on_ relationship.

In the meantime, he had work to do: it wasn't easy to keep up with the Ministry and attempt a love life at the same time.


End file.
